OFS and Lucent Technologies Receive R&D 100 Award From R&D Magazine for The Tunable Dispersion Compensator; OFS Laboratories and Bell Labs Recognized for Inventing One of the 100 Most Technologically Significant New Products and Processes of the Year.

ATLANTA, and MURRAY HILL, N.J. -- OFS, designer, manufacturer and
supplier of leading edge fiber optic products, and Lucent Technologies
today announced they have won R&D Magazine's 2002 R&D 100
Award for development of the RightWave(TM) Tunable Dispersion
Compensator (TDC), a state-of-the-art optical networking component for
communication networks. The R&D 100 Award is one of the most
prestigious honors in applied research, having previously been given to
technological breakthroughs such as the printer, the fax and the
automatic teller machine.

Originally invented at Lucent's Bell Labs, the RightWave TDC
is a dynamically adjustable, all-optical device that is a key enabler
for optical transmission rates of 40 gigabits/second (Gbit/sec). After
Lucent's Optical Fiber Solutions business was sold in November
2001, it became known as OFS; many of the device's developers are
now part of OFS Laboratories, where they continue to support it through
research.

The dispersion compensator addresses the problem of chromatic
aberration -- the tendency of light pulses traveling through optical
fiber to spread out and begin to overlap each other since the individual
wavelengths or colors of light that comprise the pulses travel at
different speeds through the fiber. The scientists fabricated an
all-fiber, all-optical device that can dynamically compensate for
chromatic dispersion. The device's compact size, low power
consumption, completely non-mechanical operation and superb optical
characteristics make this component a robust and important part of an
optical transmission system.

"It is very gratifying to be rewarded for the development of
the idea of the tunable dispersion compensator," said Benjamin
Eggleton, director of the photonic devices research department at OFS
Laboratories and research director, Specialty Photonics Division, OFS,
and one the inventors of the device. "We listened to customer
needs which led to the development of the flexible TDC."

"It leverages new ideas that originated in basic research
efforts at Bell Labs," said John Rogers, director of nanotechnology
research at Bell Labs and a co-inventor of the device. "It
provides an excellent example of how Bell Labs and OFS Labs scientists
move research results quickly out of the labs and into important
real-world applications."

The editors of R&D Magazine selected the recipients of this
award from entries initially reviewed and screened by outside experts,
including professional consultants, university faculty and industry
researchers. Recipients of the R&D 100 Award were selected based on
technological significance and substantial improvements in new or
existing technologies. A complete report including all 100 Award
recipients will be published in the September 2002 issue of R&D
Magazine.

The TDC has also recently been awarded with Lightwave
Magazine's Optical Fiber Conference Attendees Choice Award in the
components section.

40 Gbit/sec Enabler

Previously, variations and uncertainties in the chromatic
dispersion of an installed optical fiber span had been viewed as a major
technical obstacle to the deployment of 40 Gbit/sec systems. The fixed
dispersion compensation provided by dispersion compensating fiber-based
modules is effective at data rates of 10 Gbit/sec. These modules are
also required for 40 Gbit/sec transmission systems but, alone, are
insufficient to deal with the tighter tolerances and time-varying
changes in dispersion seen by the higher data rates.

OFS' new device provides a robust solution to this challenge
by providing smooth, continuously adjustable tuning of the chromatic
dispersion at the optical receiver. This commercially available device
offers stable and reliable management of chromatic dispersion at the
tolerances required by 40 Gbit/sec data rates.

Adoption by Lucent

Lucent has recently adopted this component into its recently
introduced LambdaXtreme(TM) Transport, a next-generation DWDM core
optical networking solution that offers one platform for both
ultra-high-capacity networking and ultra-long-reach networking.
LambdaXtreme Transport is capable of sending 64 40-Gbit/sec optical
signals (or 2.56 terabits of information per second) up to 1000 km
without electrical regeneration, making it the first commercial
introduction of a 40Gbit/sec system that can carry information that far
without regeneration. By supplying the TDC to Lucent, OFS also marks
its own debut into the emerging 40Gbit/sec components market.

Technology

The OFS device employs a linearly chirped fiber Bragg grating in
conjunction with a unique heating configuration to exploit the
thermo-optic effect within the grating. In this patented device design,
tuning is accomplished in a continuous manner with fast response and low
power consumption without inducing mechanical strain in the fiber. This
highly reliable approach also avoids the use of moving parts and
free-space optics.

OFS is comprised of two shareholders including Furukawa Electric, a
multi- billion dollar global leader in optical communications and
majority shareholder, and CommScope, a world leader in broadband coaxial
cables and minority shareholder. Headquartered in Norcross, Ga., OFS
operates facilities in Avon, Connecticut; Carrollton, Georgia; Omaha,
Nebraska; Somerset, N.J.; and Sturbridge, Massachusetts, as well as
facilities in Denmark, Germany, Russia and Brazil.

With over 10,000 employees in 16 countries, Bell Labs is the
leading source of new communications technologies. Bell Labs has
generated more than 28,000 patents since 1925 and has played a pivotal
role in inventing or perfecting key communications technologies,
including transistors, digital networking and signal processing, lasers
and fiber-optic communications systems, communications satellites,
cellular telephony, electronic call switching, touch-tone dialing, and
modems. Bell Labs scientists have received six Nobel Prizes in Physics,
nine U.S. Medals of Science and eight U.S. Medals of Technology. For
more information about Bell Labs, visit its Web site at
http://www.bell-labs.com/ .

Lucent Technologies, headquartered in Murray Hill, N.J., USA,
designs and delivers networks for the world's largest
communications service providers. Backed by Bell Labs research and
development, Lucent relies on its strengths in mobility, optical, data
and voice networking technologies as well as software and services to
develop next-generation networks. The company's systems, services
and software are designed to help customers quickly deploy and better
manage their networks and create new, revenue-generating services that
help businesses and consumers. For more information on Lucent
Technologies, visit its Web site at http://www.lucent.com/ .

Reader Opinion

OFS and Lucent Technologies Receive R&D 100 Award From R&D Magazine for The Tunable Dispersion Compensator; OFS Laboratories and Bell Labs Recognized for Inventing One of the 100 Most Technologically Significant New Products and Processes of the Year.